The Buddha lived 2,600 years ago. He was a real person with bodily pains and difficult relatives just like us, but he found complete freedom in the midst of these challenges. The Buddha’s teachings spread across Asia, and Buddhist practices have been adapted to many cultures and peoples.
The Buddha lived 2,600 years ago. He was a real person with bodily pains and difficult relatives just like us, but he found complete freedom in the midst of these challenges. The Buddha’s teachings spread across Asia, and Buddhist practices have been adapted to many cultures and peoples.
It is said that the entirety of the Buddha’s teachings can be found in the Four Noble Truths. It is said that the entirety of the Buddha’s teachings can be found in the Four Noble Truths: 1) dukkha, 2) the origin of dukkha, 3) the cessation of dukkha, and 4) the path of practice leading to the cessation of dukkha.
With the understanding of the truths of dukkha, the cause of dukkha and the end of dukkha, we can embark on the Eightfold Path – the path that leads to awakening and the end of suffering. The elements and practice of the Eightfold Path are as follows: panna (wisdom), sila (ethical behavior and the precepts), and samadhi (concentration).
The Ten Paramis (generosity, virtue, renunciation, discernment, equanimity, patience, persistence, truth, determination, and goodwill) are beautiful qualities associated with an awakened mind.
The Three Characteristics are the three aspects that pervade all of conditioned phenomena: anicca, dukkha, and anatta -or impermanence, suffering, and not-self. When we begin to see these attributes in all of experience, wisdom arises that enables us to let go of clinging.
According to the Buddha’s teachings, the five spiritual faculties (or indriyas) are faith, effort, mindfulness, concentration and discernment. The development and balancing of these five faculties provide the support needed to navigate our spiritual life from faith to wisdom to liberation.
The four foundations of mindfulness are the body, feeling tones, mental states, and dhammas. Mindful examination of these foundations reveals the true nature of phenomena, leading to clear seeing and full awakening. In the satipatthana sutta this is described as the direct path to liberation.
Gaining insight into obstacles on the path can turn them into possibilities. The Five Hindrances (desire, ill will, sloth and torpor, restlessness, and doubt) and the Three Poisons (greed, hatred and delusion) are barriers to freedom, which can arise in our lives. Through our mindfulness practice we can transform them into doorways.
Through practicing with the Seven Factors of Awakening, we begin to see how awareness of these mind states helps us let go of unwholesome tendencies and cultivate wholesome ones, both in formal practice and in our daily lives.
| Mindfulness: Here and Now | Investigation: What’s This? | Energy: Just Right |
| Joy: Delight in Practice | Calm: Be Still | Concentration: Rock Steady |
| Equanimity: Big View | Small moments many times |
How do we cultivate energies that encourage our capacity for caring and compassion toward ourselves and others? How do we keep our hearts open through times of conflict and challenge?
We can do this by cultivating the brahma viharas – loving kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity.
The Five Aggregates (form, feelings, perceptions, mental formations, and consciousness) show how we create an illusory sense of self moment by moment. By examining them we can come to understand how we are not so much a solid self as we may have thought.
